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Showing posts from September, 2024

There's A Silver Lining in All These

I don't know how to use the compose utility on Gmail. I am going back to it because I can't make Evolution Mail work now that I am on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS. I guess about a week of this re-training and I'll be fine. Getting back to my blog's cadence. Starting to create and do more.

Wawa Dam and San Mateo Feast Day

I spoke to Lino the other day about the pictures I sent. The Wawa Dam in Montalban came as a surprise to me because there was no marketing nor information. It was just an inaugural day press conference - a visit from the President. That was how I learned about it. Was it because the Dam was at the initiative of the former politician? This dam was built to contain the water flow every rainy season brings to the cities. In addition there was the power generation benefit to the surrounding communities. The other picture was the festival of San Mateo in Sta. Ana. It is the feast day of Our Lady of Aranzazu. Lots of bibingka and suman in the picture. I had to remind Lino about the fiesta of Dulongbayan where we lived, where we all started from.

Rolly and Happy Feast Day San Mateo

I just learned my ever loyal electrician died last Thursday, September 19th. We will miss you, Rolando Ramos, Rolly. Beloved by his wife and family, may you rest in peace. Happy Fiesta mga taga-Dulongbayan, San Mateo. I am living in another barangay but I was born there. I hope it is peaceful and dry. It always rains during the day.

Health and Medicine (also Supplements)

I am on my hypertension medications. I take Losacar 50 which is a combination amlodipine and losartan blood pressure lowering combo. I am taking omega 3 fish oil EPA DHA 2000 mg daily. This addresses high blood pressure, high triglycerides and joint inflammation. It is working because my fingers and elbows are fine now. I am on Metformin 500 mg twice daily. I believe I could increase it to three times daily if I want. I want to watch for high blood sugar levels and my overweight situation. I am taking cholecalciferol (Vitamin D3) with Menaquinone (MK-7).

2024 So Far

I have a feeling of moving earth or walking off my itchiness. The growing fat in my belly tells me I am failing on many occasions to give in to this urge. My eyes are blurred by morning glory. I remember my father having the same ritual in the morning. After his weak stroke, he couldn't speak much, just a grunt but he would demonstrate with hand how he liked to wash his face. The weather wasn't helping. It's been raining cats and dogs the past week. The province of Rizal was soaked and spilled volumes of water into the bay and Laguna lake. Our Caimito tree was cut to no more than 4 feet from the ground. It was towering above the corrugated sheet metal of our roof. Now it lay horizontal on the yard. I calculated it could be made into a whole table and chairs set by a talented carpenter artist. I showed Lino the two big pieces of trunk that could only be moved if cut by a power saw in place. The road widening project in San Mateo was in the middle stage. One side of the road

Ubuntu 24.04 My First Week Impression

Ubuntu 24.04 LTS does not have the feel of a Long Term Support LTS product. I have used Ubuntu since 5.10 and other linux distributions like Arch and Fedora. My daily driver is Ubuntu. In fact I have used the Ubuntu LTS on my desktop exclusively since 10.04. I can't authenticate Gmail on Evolution Mail. I find Thunderbird slow to download my emails. So yes I can make Gmail work with Thunderbird but not Evolution. Clementine the music application has crashed twice. On both occasions Ubuntu prompted me to send a crash report. At least the crash reporting works. Ubuntu 24.04 is not an improvement on 22.04. My recommendation is stay with Ubuntu 22.04.

Post Ubuntu 24.04.1 Install: What Now?

Some important considerations here are, where's my important data? Like passkeys, passwords, authentication files etc. Obviously, it should be backed up and mine is in my cloud service. Later I would remember that I also have a copy in a usb stick somewhere. I will need these to setup my browser profile and my email. I also have my credentials on my phone. Once I authenticate my "new" device to my cloud service, syncing folders are straightforward. Like point and shoot. I wish that google drive is like Mega. Post install duties also involved updating the new operating system. I encountered a problem here as I was notified that locked files and updates cannot proceed. So if my blog reader encountered this issue as well I recommend reviewing this thread on Ask Ubuntu .  Solved my problem. Thank you Ask Ubuntu   I am missing some applications on this new install. I downloaded several applications. First on my list is Thunderbird, Evolution whichever worked fine with Gmail of

Importing zfs pools

I installed Ubuntu 24.04.1 LTS in ZFS. I have an old ZFS pool I created there, which I want use in Ubuntu 24.04. My expectation is that it required only a zfs command using the terminal.  Assuming that my hard drives have the complete set of data, the command is: # zpool import dpool  -f        ; zpool import is the import command, dpool is the name of the pool and -f to be empathic.      

Plan B: Ubuntu 24.04 Clean Install

The solution to the upgrade fiasco is to install Ubuntu 24.04 clean. I downloaded the iso using my old Acer laptop running Xubuntu 18.04. I used Transmission and the torrent download for easy use. I found a usb stick I can spare. My next problem is to find an application to create a bootable usb stick.  Fortunately, because I've used Archlinux before I am familiar with the dd command. I have no problem using the command line and the terminal to copy the ubuntu 24.04 iso and create a bootable usb stick without a graphical user interface. So after the torrent download which took me about 20 minutes, I now have a bootable usb stick containing ubuntu 24.04.1. This is the command: # dd -R if=/home/Download/Ubuntu 24.04.1 Desktop.iso of=/media/usb stick volume bs=1M status=progress     ; R means recursive, if is the source or the file location, of is the destination, name of the usb stick, status gives you a report The new Ubuntu installer is quick and straightforward. Asks you to pick